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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23416846">never to be told</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/rabbitprint/pseuds/rabbitprint'>rabbitprint</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Final Fantasy XII</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2007-08-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2007-08-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 08:59:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>534</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23416846</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/rabbitprint/pseuds/rabbitprint</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Old FF12 short, prompt: 'secret, FFXII, Fran'</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>never to be told</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Fran is deaf in her left ear. No one knows this save herself and the marlboro who took her hearing from her. She had been hunting alone in the jungle that day, confident in her own strength; she had been confident and riding the edge between rest and combat, refusing to slow down and catch her breath fully before taking to the paths again and again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had been using the bow and the sword to hunt: the bow to flush her prey, the sword to claim it. Twice, she had retreated from foolish risks. The losses did nothing to stem the edge of her aggression. She had let the wilder predators move past without taunting them, and stalked the rest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When the marlboro came, Fran had not treated it seriously, having chopped tentacles from dozens of its kin already. She had toyed with it instead, letting it draw close before dancing away, feeling the mucus of its lips heat the air against her skin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One tentacle was severed, and then another. Fran had savored the game -- here, too, she was a predator in her own right, dangerous and sleek and beautiful, a Viera whom the other races should fear. She had the blessing of the Wood. She could hear its voice embodied within each shiver of wind. She was enacting her part in the great cycle of life as passed down by the Green Word, and it was </span>
  <em>
    <span>wonderful.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Feeling the peace of utter perfection, Fran had twisted her sword around and plunged it deep into the marlboro's rubbery body.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It spasmed. Its tentacles flailed. And then it had </span>
  <em>
    <span>screamed,</span>
  </em>
  <span>its great-fanged mouth opening with a belch of foul breath and noise, the sound rising upwards through a tolerable pitch and then beyond.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Fran hit the ground howling as well, dropping the sword to cover her skull with her hands. Her fingers splayed, trying to cover everything at once and protect herself, but they weren't enough and none of it was </span>
  <em>
    <span>enough</span>
  </em>
  <span> and then she was doubled over, gagging at the stench. Her ears buzzed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She had crawled away from the marlboro and into the nearest fresh stream she could find. The world had been thick as cotton on the left side of her skull; the weight made her list to the side, stumbling and graceless. Her right ear felt buoyant by default. By the time Fran had washed off the foul ichor from her kill, she had recovered enough that her balance had been restored, but her left ear still felt clogged.</span>
  
</p><p>
  <span>It remained that way the next day. Then the day after that. She was frightened. So frightened that she told none of her sisters, no one else in the Village -- not even the salve-makers, who might have known of some sort of cure among their herbs and tonics. Instead, Fran had prayed only to the Wood to heal her injury, hoping that she would wake up the next morning with the humming gone and all her clarity restored.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eventually, the Wood provided its own answer: Fran opened her eyes one day and the ringing had faded entirely from her left ear.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So had everything else.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ten years later, she left.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
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